Bulatlat

Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile, the principal sponsor of the controversial Human Security Act, has a long history of making political and legal moves running counter to civil liberties and other democratic rights, and even of direct association with the forces of authoritarianism.

BY ALEXANDER MARTIN REMOLLINO
Bulatlat
Vol. VII, No. 24, July 22-28, 2007

The Human Security Act of 2007 (HSA), also known as the Anti-Terorrism Law, will probably go down in the annals of Philippine politics as one of the most controversial laws passed in this decade – if not in this century. Its principal sponsor is Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile.

Under the HSA, the elements of terrorism are: commission of the crimes of rebellion or insurrection, coup d’ etat, murder, arson, kidnapping and serious illegal detention, crimes involving destruction, arson, piracy and highway robbery among others, “thereby sowing and creating a condition of widespread and extraordinary fear and panic among the populace, in order to coerce the government to give in to an unlawful demand.”

The acts of armed political groups like the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army (CPP-NPA), and the Magdalo may be classified by the government as falling under rebellion or insurrection, in the case of the CPP-NPA; or coup d’ etat, in the case of the Magdalo. These groups run the risk of being proscribed as “terrorist” groups under the HSA – especially considering that the Arroyo regime lobbied for the inclusion of the CPP-NPA and CPP founding chairman Jose Maria Sison in the U.S. Department of State’s “terrorist” list.

There is, however, nothing in the HSA that prevents unarmed and legal cause-oriented or opposition groups like the Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan or New Patriotic Alliance) and the United Opposition (UNO) from being accused of fronting for “communist” or “rebel military” organizations – as the Arroyo administration has repeatedly done. Likewise there is nothing in the said law that prevents journalists covering “insurgency” or even legal mass actions from being accused of “conspiracy to commit terrorism.”

The HSA legalizes the warrantless arrest and prolonged detention of people just suspected – not even caught in the act – of committing “terrorism” or “conspiring to commit terrorism” as defined in the said law.

With that, the HSA creates openings for its use by the government in cracking down even on the legal protest movement.

Passed in February this year and having taken effect last July 13, the HSA is principally authored by Sen. Manuel Villar. Co-authors of the law are Sens. Panfilo Lacson, Jinggoy Estrada, Ramon Magsaysay Jr., and Joker Arroyo.

The man mainly responsible for propelling what was previously known as Senate Bill No. 2137 to passage was Enrile, who chaired the Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights in the 13th Congress.

Enrile authored the first Anti-Terrorism Bill filed in Congress in 1996 – five years before the word “terrorism” became an international household word following the bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City and U.S. President George W. Bush’s subsequent declaration of a “borderless war on terror.”

But Enrile’s record goes beyond that. He has a long history of making political and legal moves running counter to civil liberties and other democratic rights, and even of direct association with the forces of authoritarianism.

The Marcos connection

Enrile’s first foray into government was as undersecretary of finance when he was appointed in 1966. That began his long association with then President Ferdinand Marcos, who was then serving a first term. Before that, he had been working as a corporate lawyer.

In 1968, Marcos made him secretary of justice. Two years later, he was made secretary of national defense – a position he was holding when martial law was declared.

He has not been one to be shamefaced about his role in the imposition of martial law in 1972. In fact, he even boasted in a 1991 television interview of having been himself an architect of martial law. “I am the author of martial law,” he said in the interview, which was conducted just shortly before the 1992 presidential elections in which he had originally planned to run for president.

At 9 p.m. on Sept 22, 1972, as he was on his way home to Dasmariñas Village in Makati, the convoy which included his car was ambushed. He escaped unharmed.

The following dawn, several outspoken critics of the Marcos regime were arrested – among them Sens. Jose W. Diokno and Francisco “Soc” Rodrigo, lawyer Haydee Yorac, and journalist Amando Doronila.

At 3 p.m. the next day, then Press Secretary Francisco Tatad went on national television and radio reading Proclamation No. 1081, which placed the country under martial law.

Four hours later, Marcos himself went on air to formally announce the proclamation. The president imposed a curfew and banned public demonstrations.

The Enrile ambush was one of the incidents cited by Marcos as pretext for the imposition of Proclamation No. 1081 – which was dated Sept. 21, 1972.

Enrile has admitted, in a number of media interviews, of having personally issued several arrest, search and seizure orders (ASSOs) during Martial Law. On some occasions he has defended himself by saying these ASSOs all had Marcos’ signature.

As historian-economist Ricco Alejandro M. Santos analyzes it, Martial Law was a response by the Marcos regime to socio-political trends that emerged in the time of his predecessor, Diosdado Macapagal. Santos, in a 2003 article for Bulatlat wrote:

"Instructed by the IMF (International Monetary Fund), the elder Macapagal in 1961 instituted decontrol – the free inflow of imports through tariff reductions, and the free repatriation of dollar profits by foreign investors. This first policy measure of Macapagal set the Philippine economy into a tailspin, wiping out more than 10,000 businesses, and creating even greater poverty. Decontrol tightened the (neocolonization) of the economy, and whatever small gains were achieved in Filipino industrialization during the period of import and exchange controls."

The conditions that this development generated were filling up the streets with protesters – workers, peasants, students and intellectuals, and even sections of the business community.

Marcos assumed his first presidential term in 1965 amid a nascent political ferment. During his second term (starting 1969), nationalist dissent found its way into the corridors of the political establishment. Santos cites three major nationalist developments in the period 1969-1972:

“In 1969, Congress under pressure from a growing anti-imperialist public opinion, passed a Magna Carta that call(ed) for national industrialization against the dictates of the IMF. Then from 1971 to 1972, nationalists were gaining ground in gathering support for an anti-imperialist agenda in the Constitutional Convention. In 1972, the Supreme Court (SC) issued two decisions unfavorable to foreign monopolist corporations: one, in the Quasha case, which nullified all sales of private lands to American citizens after 1945, and (an)other rolled back oil price hikes by the oil cartel.”

Marcos’ very first act after the issuance of Proclamation No. 1081 was a reversal of the Quasha case. A report by the U.S. Congress would later admit that the martial law period was a time for the granting of greater privileges to foreign investment.

Human rights violations

Not only was Enrile the architect of martial law. As secretary of national defense, Enrile presided over the military establishment at a time when it was at the peak of its power. The military’s Martial Law record is fraught with human rights violations.

Based on data from military historian Alfred McCoy, there were a total of 35,000 political prisoners tortured during Martial Law. The torture methods ranged from electrocution of the genitals, “water cure,” and injection of mind-altering substances to threats of death to sexual molestation and even rape – of both women and men.

Data from Karapatan (Alliance for the Advancement of People’s Rights) also show 759 persons as having involuntarily disappeared during Martial Law.

Likewise, data from various human rights groups place the number of victims of extrajudicial killings under Marcos’ rule at 1,500. Previous to their killings, the victims were all tagged by the Marcos regime as “subversives” – a euphemism which, as used by government at that time, is similar to today’s state usage of the term “terrorist.”

EDSA and after

In February 1986, in a press conference with then Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Fidel V. Ramos in which they announced their defection to the opposition, Enrile admitted that he had faked his own ambush in 1972 to provide a scare scenario that would justify the declaration of martial law shortly after.

On Feb. 25 that same year, Marcos was ousted in what is now known as the EDSA I uprising.

Enrile briefly served as defense secretary under the Corazon Aquino government until he was sacked for his alleged role in a coup attempt led by then Col. Gregorio Honasan. He won a Senate seat in 1987.

As a senator from 1987 to 1992, he briefly distinguished himself by being among the “Magnificent 12” senators who voted against the extension of the RP-U.S. Military Bases Treaty.

In 1992, he ran for and won a seat in the House of Representatives, representing his province of Cagayan. Three years later, he won in the senatorial elections amid accusations that he was a beneficiary of dagdag-bawas (vote-padding and vote-shaving) operations in a neck-to-neck race for the 12th seat against Aquilino Pimentel, Jr. – then his party-mate in the Lakas-Laban Coalition. In 1996 he filed the first Anti-Terrorism Bill, which never saw the light of day because of intense broad protest.

In 1998, Enrile ran for president – claiming in a television interview to be “the only one qualified to manage the country.” He figured poorly, however, and after the election returned to the Senate and promptly threw his support behind the winner, former actor Joseph Estrada.

When former First Lady Imelda Marcos celebrated her birthday in 1998, Enrile was among the well-wishers present. He was caught on TV getting a pat on the back from the former first lady, who said: “This man is actually a Marcos boy.”

He supported Estrada during the latter’s impeachment trial for bribery, graft and corrupt practices, betrayal of public trust, and culpable violation of the Constitution.

Estrada was ousted in January 2001 in what is now known as the EDSA II uprising.

Enrile ran again for senator in 2001, counting on his opposition to the unpopular Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA). The EPIRA ushered in, among other things, the imposition of the Power Purchase Adjustment (PPA) which sent electric bills soaring. He lost, however, and had to wait another three years to win another Senate term – after which he aligned himself with the administration camp.

In 2006, Enrile as chairman of the Senate Committee on Justice and Human Rights led in propelling Senate Bill No. 2137 to passage. The bill was passed in February this year and is now known as the HSA or the Anti-Terrorism Law. Bulatlat